Dead Letters(94)

Goddamnit, Zaza. Where the fuck are you hiding?



I send the email in a fury, stabbing at the screen in frustration. Immediately, I receive an email in response:


I’m not where you think I am



“Fucking hell!” I swear to my empty room.





22


Very twitchy and anxious, I pace around my room. I’ve even Googled other hotels near my apartment, looking for any that start with a V. Or W, X, Y, or Z, in case I’ve gotten ahead of the game with my deduction that Zelda is in France. But I find nothing. I could search all the hotels of Paris, I suppose, call around and see if she’s in any of them. I could go to the cops, tell them about my missing passport and my suspicions, and they could check with immigration to see if Zelda flew anywhere. I could call the credit card companies to see if any charges have been made, any flights booked….But Zelda would have booked them on someone else’s card, I’m sure of it—stolen one from Jason or Holly or Kayla. Fuck, maybe even Wyatt. I should ask him. The cops knew about her last trip to France, but they hadn’t mentioned any others. With a sense of unease, I wonder if I’m being framed. My head is spinning, and I want nothing more than another mimosa.

I text Nico, cryptically asking him if he’ll lurk around H?tel Victoires whenever he has a second and let me know if someone who looks just like me is wandering around in the Second Arrondissement. Moments after I send the text, my phone rings. Nico. I don’t answer. I know this is assholic, I know I should pick up and explain, but I don’t have it in me. I cover my eyes with my hands and wait for the phone to stop vibrating, too guilty to tap the decline icon. A text arrives shortly after.


I don’t know what is going with you, Ava. Is your sister living? Do I look for her? Please call me back. I will go to the hotel when I am finish work. Xoxo



I’m using him. I’m deeply, harrowingly aware of that, but I push it from my mind. I don’t respond. It would look strange if I texted back immediately after failing to pick up the phone. Let him think I’m driving. I have just sent him off to squander his evening on what will most likely turn out to be a waste of time.

Irritated, I review my options. Really, I want nothing more than to put Zelda and her shenanigans out of my mind. To do something relaxing, unrelated. But she’s the only reason I’m here, and her antics have me thoroughly occupied. It seems unthinkable that I might drive to Ithaca to have a massage, get in touch with old friends, and meet for a drink somewhere in town. I should work on my dissertation, but that seems inconceivable. I’m like a live wire, incapable of quieting the electrical thrum that pulses in me. I feel like screaming. Frantically, I strip off yesterday’s clothes and retrieve the bathing suit from the floor. I fling it on, knot a sarong around my midriff, and dash downstairs. Opal and Marlon look up at the noise, but I don’t pause to explain.

I snatch up a pristine pair of white Keds, Nadine’s. I’ve seen her wear them only once; they seemed outrageously sporty for her, though they somehow suited her elegant party dress. It was for someone’s birthday, though I can’t remember whose. Whose birthday? Why can’t I remember? After fumbling with the laces, I nearly fall out the glass doors onto the patio.

I run down the grassy slope of the lawn, toward the trail to the water, cinching the sarong tightly around my breasts. Small as they are, they still bounce uncomfortably, unsupported by the slender strings noosed about my neck, and I try to more or less strap them down with the sarong. Limited success. I am moving so fast down the hill that I’m in danger of face-planting, tripping over a stray root and causing serious injury, but I don’t care in the slightest. The momentum is the best part, and I feel blissfully out of control as I let my body take over, my feet slamming the dirt one ahead of the other. Heading down.

I make it to the water’s edge without tumbling over my own feet. I barely even slow my pace to shuck off the sneakers and fling my sarong aside. I’m still running when I hit the water, and the cold slaps against my thighs and sprays up my belly. My nipples immediately harden. I dive under the water as soon as I am waist-deep and let the chill of Seneca Lake close over my head in relief.

—

I swim for nearly an hour, doing laps up and down the beach, then swimming out and swimming back, going nowhere. Finally, exhausted and barely able to flail another stroke, I beach myself, crawling up onto the stones, not yet warmed by the sun. I lie on my back just feet from the water, shivering and blue-tinged. My arms are quaking, and I can feel ripples and spasms in my glutes. I’m reminded of how horses look when they’ve been run hard, the muscles of their hindquarters glistening with sweat and twitching. I drip into the stones.

When the sun has dried me off, I sit up and reach for my sarong, which I tug around my shoulders. Staring out at the water, I have no idea what to do. I rock back and forth on my haunches, mumbling to Zelda. I get up eventually, and walk toward the rickety dock. I step out onto it, and it creaks menacingly below me. I can feel it sway. It used to be a pirate ship, sailing off into the sunset with Zelda at the helm, me the navigator in the back. Sometimes it was an island, and we would hang off it, scooping up rocks and seaweed and tiny fish in a bid for survival. Sometimes it was an Olympic diving board, and we were world-class athletes competing for a double gold. Now it is rotting, unsteady. Unsafe. I bounce, feeling the architecture again shift below me, and spring off it anxiously, back onto solid ground. One big storm and it will float off into the lake.